Research-Based Product Review: Time to Talk SLT Autism Assessment in Ireland
                     An independent, evidence-informed overview of Time to Talk SLT (timetotalkslt.com), 
separating what the website states from what published research says about the underlying 
clinical approaches.
Quick Overview
Time to Talk SLT is a private speech and language therapy and autism assessment clinic based
in Clonmel, Co. Tipperary, Ireland. According to the Time to Talk SLT website, the practice is 
run by a CORU-registered speech and language therapist (Ahlem Birem) who works alongside 
a senior clinical psychologist for autism assessments, and offers both in-person and teletherapy 
appointments to families across Ireland.
This review does two separate things. It summarizes what the website itself says about its 
services, and it summarizes what independent, peer-reviewed research says about the general 
clinical approaches involved: speech and language therapy, autism diagnostic assessment 
using ADOS-2/ADI-R, teletherapy, and stammering intervention. The second part is not a 
verification of Time to Talk SLT's specific outcomes. No independent, published data on this 
individual clinic's results was found. Individual experiences and outcomes may vary, and no 
service can guarantee a specific result for a specific child.
What Time to Talk SLT Is
According to the Time to Talk SLT website, the practice:
● Is based in Clonmel, Co. Tipperary, with services also offered nationwide via 
teletherapy.
● Is led by Ahlem Birem, described on the site as a CORU-registered Speech and 
Language Therapist and member of the Irish Association of Speech and Language 
Therapists (IASLT).
● Works with Dr Carol O'Dwyer, described as a Senior Clinical Psychologist, for autism 
assessments.
● Operates as a private clinic, not part of the HSE, meaning families access it directly 
rather than through public referral.
What can be independently verified: CORU is Ireland's statutory regulator for health and social 
care professionals, and speech and language therapist is a legally protected title in Ireland. A 
person must be registered with CORU's Speech and Language Therapists Registration Board 
to use it. This board was established under the Health and Social Care Professionals Act 2005, 
the register opened in October 2014, and the title became officially protected on 31 October 
2016. IASLT is a genuine, established professional membership body for SLTs in Ireland. These
are facts about the regulatory and professional framework, not a confirmation of this specific 
practitioner's individual registration status. For that, the CORU public register (coru.ie) is the 
authoritative source, and parents are encouraged to check it directly.
What the Website Says It Offers
Based on publicly available pages on timetotalkslt.com, the website states that it offers:
● Autism assessment, described as a comprehensive, multi-disciplinary assessment 
(SLT plus clinical psychologist) using ADOS-2 and ADI-R, typically over 3 to 4 
appointments, with a report the website states is accepted by the HSE and the 
Department of Education. The website states no GP referral is required.
● Language Delay support, for children the site describes as following typical 
developmental patterns but at a slower pace.
● Developmental Language Disorder (DLD) assessment and therapy, for language 
difficulties the site describes as not resolving without support.
● Speech Sound / Articulation Difficulties, including support for diagnosed dyspraxia.
● Stammering (dysfluency) assessment and support.
● Teletherapy, delivered by secure video call, described on the site as being to the same 
clinical standard as in-person appointments.
● The website also lists Selective Mutism, Global Developmental Delay, Hearing 
Impairment Disability, and Social Communication Difficulties among the areas it 
supports, without describing dedicated service pages for each.
● The site states appointments are typically available within one to two weeks, and 
describes a policy of avoiding long waiting lists.
● The site references possible partial reimbursement through private health insurers, such 
as Laya and VHI, and Irish Revenue's tax relief on qualifying medical and therapy 
expenses, without stating specific costs.
What could not be independently verified: exact fee amounts, session-by-session pricing, the 
total number of families seen, or any quantitative outcome data, such as how many children's 
speech intelligibility or language scores improved, by how much, or over what timeframe. The 
website includes several parent testimonials. These are self-reported, published by the business
itself, and were not independently verified as part of this review.
How This Type of Service or Approach Generally Works
Independent of this specific clinic, private paediatric speech and language therapy and autism 
assessment services in Ireland generally follow a broadly similar pattern:
1. Initial contact and intake, often without needing a GP referral, since SLTs in Ireland, in 
both the public and private systems, are typically a first point of contact for 
communication concerns.
2. Assessment, combining play-based or informal observation, standardized or semi-
structured tools, and, for autism specifically, parent interview instruments such as the 
ADI-R alongside direct clinician observation instruments such as the ADOS-2.
3. Feedback and, where relevant, a formal report. For autism assessments, this typically
needs to meet specific criteria to be accepted by bodies like the HSE or Department of 
Education for service and school-support purposes.
4. Therapy, which varies substantially by target area. Phonological or articulation 
approaches suit speech sound difficulties, vocabulary- and syntax-focused approaches 
suit language delay, and structured behavioural programmes such as the Lidcombe 
Program suit early stammering.
5. Delivery mode: in person, via teletherapy, or a mix, depending on family location and 
preference.
This general model is consistent across many private practices in Ireland and elsewhere. It is 
not unique to Time to Talk SLT, and its presence on a website is not itself evidence of quality. It 
reflects a fairly standard service structure in the field.
What Research and Evidence Say
This section summarizes independent, peer-reviewed research on the general approaches Time
to Talk SLT's website says it uses. It is not a study of this clinic.
Speech and language therapy effectiveness for children
A Cochrane and Campbell systematic review and meta-analysis (Law, Garrett & Nye, 2003, 
updated 2005), covering roughly 25 to 36 studies and around 1,500 children, found speech and 
language therapy interventions had a positive effect for children with expressive phonological 
difficulties (standardized mean difference, SMD = 0.44) and expressive vocabulary difficulties 
(SMD = 0.89). Evidence for expressive syntax, or grammar, interventions was mixed, and the 
review found no clear evidence of benefit for receptive, or understanding, language difficulties 
specifically. This is a meaningful nuance, since not all types of speech or language difficulty 
have equally strong evidence behind their treatment. The same review noted that unresolved 
speech and language difficulties in early childhood can be associated with longer-term literacy, 
social, and academic difficulties if they persist into the school years.
A separate randomised controlled trial (Broomfield & Dodd, 2011), following 730 children 
referred to a UK public SLT service, found that an average of about 5.5 to 6 hours of therapy 
over 6 months produced significantly better outcomes than no treatment for children with 
primary speech and/or language impairment.
Research suggests speech and language therapy has fairly strong evidence behind it for certain
difficulty types, particularly phonology and expressive vocabulary, and weaker or mixed 
evidence for others, particularly receptive language and grammar. This is a general finding 
about the field, not a claim about any individual therapist's results.
Autism assessment tools (ADOS-2 and ADI-R)
The ADOS-2 (Autism Diagnostic Observation Schedule, Second Edition) and ADI-R (Autism 
Diagnostic Interview-Revised) are widely described in the peer-reviewed literature as the gold 
standard instruments for autism diagnostic assessment, typically used in combination with 
clinical judgment and other developmental information rather than in isolation. Reported 
sensitivity and specificity for the ADOS-2 generally fall in the 83 to 91% and 80 to 94% range 
across modules and studies, and combined ADOS-2/ADI-R use has been shown in some 
studies to improve diagnostic validity compared with either tool alone.
Evidence also points to some meaningful caveats. Administering these tools well requires 
substantial training, and inter-rater reliability among clinicians trained only to a clinical, rather 
than research, standard has been reported as lower in at least one study. One Australian study 
found only 24% of clinically trained assessors reached good or excellent agreement on ADOS-
based diagnoses when reviewing the same recorded assessments. Neither tool is required by 
the DSM-5 for a diagnosis, and some researchers have argued the field should reconsider 
treating this specific combination as the only defensible gold standard, partly due to the length 
and resource burden of using both tools together. This is general evidence about these 
instruments as used in the field. It does not describe how skilfully or consistently any particular 
individual clinician administers them.
Teletherapy and telepractice for children's speech and language services
A systematic review (Wales, Skinner & Hayman, 2017), covering seven eligible studies, found 
telehealth-delivered and in-person speech-language therapy produced significant and broadly 
similar improvements on most outcome measures for primary-school-age children, describing 
the evidence as limited but promising. Later reviews and studies, including work specifically on 
stammering, cleft palate, and general paediatric speech sound disorders, have generally 
reinforced this picture of a comparable but still-growing evidence base, while several authors 
caution that overall certainty remains low to moderate due to small sample sizes and study 
variation.
Research suggests teletherapy is a fairly well-supported delivery method for many, though not 
necessarily all, types of paediatric speech and language need, rather than an unproven or fringe
approach. It is not yet established as definitively equivalent to in-person care in every context.
Stammering (dysfluency) intervention in young children
The Lidcombe Program, a parent-delivered behavioural treatment for early stammering, has one
of the stronger evidence bases among childhood stuttering interventions. A randomised 
controlled trial (Jones et al., 2005) found a highly significant reduction in stuttering frequency in 
the treatment group compared to a waitlist control group at nine months, with a mean of 1.5% of
syllables stuttered versus 3.9% in controls. A Cochrane review (Sjøstrand et al., 2019) identified
it as having the best available trial evidence among early stuttering interventions, based on four 
randomised trials against waitlist controls. Telehealth-delivered versions of the Lidcombe 
Program have also shown outcomes comparable to in-clinic delivery in controlled trials, 
including in school-age children between 6 and 12, a group with historically less research 
behind it.
Evidence indicates early intervention for stammering is generally considered clinically important.
Spontaneous recovery in the first year is uncommon, with some sources citing under 10%, and 
treatment is generally considered to become more difficult the longer stammering persists. That 
said, a meaningful minority of children, with some studies suggesting around 15 to 30%, 
experience some relapse after treatment.
Potential Benefits
Based on the general research above, not on verified data about this specific clinic, families 
using a service structured the way Time to Talk SLT's website describes may benefit from:
● Faster access to assessment and therapy than the current Irish public system typically 
offers (see the Limitations section below for public system wait-time context).
● Diagnostic tools (ADOS-2/ADI-R) with a fairly strong independent evidence base when 
administered well.
● Therapy approaches, for phonology, expressive vocabulary, and stammering in 
particular, that have supportive peer-reviewed evidence.
● A teletherapy option, which research suggests is a credible delivery mode for many 
families, particularly those facing distance or scheduling barriers.
● CORU registration, if independently confirmed for the individual practitioner, providing a 
baseline of regulatory accountability not present with unregulated "speech coach" type 
providers.
This is not a guarantee of improvement for any individual child. Outcomes in this field vary by 
difficulty type, severity, consistency of engagement with therapy and home practice, and other 
individual factors that research on group averages cannot predict for any one case.
Limitations and Important Considerations
No independent outcome data exists for this specific clinic. Everything about results, client 
satisfaction, and success rates that appears on the website is self-published and was not 
independently verified in this review.
Cost is a real factor. The website does not publish specific fees on the pages reviewed, and 
while it references possible insurance reimbursement and Revenue tax relief, exact out-of-
pocket costs were not confirmed here. Private autism assessment in Ireland has been reported 
by other providers at figures generally in the low thousands of euros; this figure illustrates the 
broader private market in Ireland, not a confirmed Time to Talk SLT price.
Evidence strength varies by difficulty type. As above, the research base is notably stronger for 
phonological or articulation and expressive vocabulary work and for early stammering 
intervention, and comparatively weaker for receptive language difficulties.
Waiting-list context matters for interpreting "fast access" claims. Independent reporting indicates
the Irish public Assessment of Need system had an average wait of around 27 months as of 
mid-2026, against a statutory 6-month target, with more than 20,000 children reported to be 
waiting nationally and a new HSE assessment protocol still in early rollout. This is genuine, 
independently reported context for why private options exist and are in demand. It is not a 
statement about Time to Talk SLT's own capacity or quality relative to other private providers.
A diagnostic tool is only as good as its administration. As noted above, published research has 
found real variability in inter-rater agreement among clinically, rather than research, trained 
ADOS-2/ADI-R assessors. This is a property of the field generally, and no independent data is 
available on this specific clinic's inter-rater reliability.
Quality, Accuracy, and Professional Standards
According to the Time to Talk SLT website, the practice operates under CORU registration and 
IASLT membership, and states its autism assessment reports are accepted by the HSE and 
Department of Education.
Independently, CORU registration is a genuine legal requirement to use the title Speech and 
Language Therapist in Ireland, administered under a specific Code of Professional Conduct and
Ethics, with mandatory continuing professional development requirements for registrants. 
Whether a specific private report is accepted by a specific HSE Children's Disability Network 
Team or a specific school's Special Educational Needs process can, in practice, depend on the 
individual case and local team. This is a general feature of how the Irish system handles private 
diagnostic reports, not something this review can confirm applies identically to every report this 
practice issues.
Parents wanting to confirm current registration status of any individual practitioner can search 
the public CORU register directly at coru.ie, free of charge. This is a straightforward, 
recommended verification step regardless of which provider a family is considering.
Human Expertise and Individualized Support
Speech and language development and autism presentation both vary enormously between 
individual children, and the research summarized above is drawn from group-level studies: 
average effects across many children, not predictions for any one child. The website's 
description of individualized assessment, covering parental interview, play-based observation, 
formal testing, and tailored feedback, is broadly consistent with how the general literature 
describes good-practice paediatric SLT assessment. Whether that individualization is delivered 
skilfully in any specific case depends on the training, experience, and clinical judgment of the 
individual clinician, factors that cannot be assessed from a website alone.
Ethical, Privacy, and Accessibility Considerations
As with any healthcare provider handling a child's clinical information, families may wish to 
review the practice's privacy and data-handling policy, referenced in the website's footer, before 
booking, particularly regarding teletherapy platforms and how session recordings or notes are 
stored.
CORU's Code of Professional Conduct and Ethics for SLTs includes requirements around 
obtaining informed consent for assessment and treatment. This is a general professional 
standard, not a claim about this practice's specific consent process.
The website states both in-person appointments in Clonmel and nationwide teletherapy options 
are available. Per the telepractice research summarized above, this is a fairly well-evidenced 
way to reduce geographic access barriers, though teletherapy is not equally suitable for every 
child or every type of difficulty. Very young children, or those needing significant hands-on 
assessment components, may be better served in person, according to general clinical 
guidance in this field.
Independent reporting on the Irish system notes disparities in public waiting times by region and
socioeconomic factors, which is relevant background for understanding why private options 
carry real cost and access trade-offs for families rather than being a simple better alternative for 
everyone.
Who May Benefit
Based on the general research and the website's own description of its services, families who 
may find a service structured this way relevant include those:
● Facing long HSE public waiting times who have the financial means to access private 
assessment or therapy.
● Whose child has speech sound, or articulation, difficulties, or expressive vocabulary 
difficulties, where the therapy evidence base is comparatively stronger.
● Whose child has recently begun stammering, given the strength of early-intervention 
evidence for approaches like the Lidcombe Program.
● Living outside Munster or otherwise facing travel or scheduling barriers, given the 
general evidence supporting teletherapy as a credible, if not universally interchangeable,
delivery mode.
● Seeking a diagnostic report for school or HSE support purposes, provided they 
independently confirm in advance that the specific report format will be accepted by their
local team.
Who Should Be Cautious
● Families relying primarily on health insurance or tax relief to make costs manageable 
should independently confirm exact reimbursement amounts and eligibility with their 
insurer and Revenue before committing, since this review could not verify specific 
figures.
● Families whose child's primary difficulty is with receptive, or understanding, language 
may want to ask directly what evidence-based approach will be used, given that this is 
the area where the general SLT research base is weakest.
● Anyone assuming a private report is automatically and unconditionally accepted by 
every HSE team or school should verify this for their specific local service beforehand 
rather than assuming it based on general website claims.
● Families who have not independently confirmed the treating clinician's current CORU 
registration status, via coru.ie, before booking, given that CORU registration is a legal 
requirement for using the SLT title in Ireland.
Practical Checklist Before Using the Service
1. Independently verify the treating SLT's current CORU registration on coru.ie.
2. Ask directly for current, itemized fees for assessment and therapy, and get written 
confirmation of what is and isn't included.
3. If insurance reimbursement matters to your decision, contact your insurer directly to 
confirm your specific plan's coverage before booking. Don't rely solely on general 
statements that insurance "may cover" costs.
4. If a diagnostic report is needed for a specific HSE team or school process, ask that team
directly what report format and content they require, and confirm with the clinic that this 
will be met.
5. Ask what specific assessment tools and therapy approaches will be used for your child's 
particular difficulty, and how that maps to the evidence discussed above.
6. Clarify in advance which parts of the process, if any, will be delivered via teletherapy 
versus in person, if that matters to you.
7. Ask about typical session frequency and expected duration of a course of therapy, since 
evidence-based programmes, such as Lidcombe, generally specify these fairly 
concretely.
Frequently Asked Questions
Is Time to Talk SLT a licensed or regulated provider? The website states its practitioner is 
CORU-registered and an IASLT member. CORU registration is a genuine legal requirement to 
use the Speech and Language Therapist title in Ireland. Independent verification of this specific 
practitioner's current status is available free at coru.ie.
Is speech and language therapy scientifically proven to work? Independent research 
indicates it has a fairly strong evidence base for some difficulty types, notably phonological or 
articulation and expressive vocabulary difficulties, and a weaker evidence base for others, 
notably receptive language difficulties. It is not a uniform, universally proven intervention across 
all presentations. Evidence strength depends on the specific difficulty being treated.
Are ADOS-2 and ADI-R reliable autism diagnostic tools? Independent research describes 
them as the field's leading, or gold standard, instruments, with generally good reported 
sensitivity and specificity, particularly when used together and administered by well-trained 
clinicians. Research has also documented real variability in diagnostic agreement among 
clinically, versus research, trained assessors, which is a general limitation of the field rather 
than a statement about any specific clinician.
Does teletherapy work as well as in-person therapy? Systematic reviews describe 
teletherapy as producing broadly similar outcomes to in-person therapy for many children, with 
the overall evidence characterized as promising but still developing, and with better support for 
older or school-age children than for very young children.
Why would a family choose a private clinic over the HSE? Independent reporting indicates 
Irish public autism assessment wait times have averaged around 27 months against a legal 6-
month target, with a large national backlog. This is commonly cited as a key reason families 
consider private options, a system-level, independently reported fact rather than a claim specific
to any one private provider.
Can this review confirm Time to Talk SLT's specific results? No. No independent, published
outcome data on this specific clinic was found. The research in this review concerns the general
clinical approaches the website says it uses, not verified evidence of this particular practice's 
individual results.
Balanced Final Verdict
Time to Talk SLT describes itself as a CORU-registered, private speech and language therapy 
and autism assessment practice offering a service structure, assessment using recognized 
tools, individualized therapy, teletherapy access, and HSE/Department of Education-accepted 
reporting, that is broadly consistent with general good practice in the field, as described in 
independent professional and regulatory sources. The clinical approaches referenced, SLT for 
phonology, vocabulary, and stammering, and ADOS-2/ADI-R for autism assessment, 
teletherapy delivery, each have real, published peer-reviewed evidence behind them, with 
evidence strength varying meaningfully by specific difficulty type. It is generally stronger for 
phonological and expressive vocabulary work and early stammering intervention, and weaker 
for receptive language difficulties.
What this review cannot do is confirm this specific clinic's actual outcomes, exact pricing, or the 
individual clinician's current registration status and clinical experience level. Those require 
direct, independent verification by any family considering the service, via CORU's public 
register, direct fee inquiries, and direct confirmation with any HSE team or school that a report 
needs to satisfy. The strength of the underlying evidence for the types of service offered is a 
reasonable starting point for a family's research, but it is not a substitute for that direct 
verification, nor a guarantee of any particular outcome for any individual child.
Selected Sources
● Law, J., Garrett, Z., & Nye, C. (2003, updated 2005). Speech and language therapy 
interventions for children with primary speech and language delay or disorder. Cochrane
Database of Systematic Reviews / Campbell Systematic Reviews.
● Broomfield, J., & Dodd, B. (2011). Is speech and language therapy effective for children 
with primary speech and language impairment? International Journal of Language & 
Communication Disorders, 46, 628 to 640.
● Sensitivity and specificity, and gold-standard status, of ADOS-2/ADI-R: multiple peer-
reviewed sources including Frontiers in Psychology (2017), ScienceDirect Topics 
summaries, and Taylor et al. (2017) on inter-rater reliability.
● Wales, D., Skinner, L., & Hayman, M. (2017). The efficacy of telehealth-delivered 
speech and language intervention for primary school-age children: A systematic review. 
International Journal of Telerehabilitation, 9(1), 55 to 70.
● Jones, M., et al. (2005). Randomised controlled trial of the Lidcombe Program for early 
stammering intervention. BMJ.
● Sjøstrand, Å., et al. (2019). Behavioural and cognitive behavioural therapy for children 
who stutter. Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews.
● CORU (coru.ie): Speech and Language Therapists Registration Board information.
● Irish Examiner, Irish Times, and RTÉ reporting (May to June 2026) on the HSE Autism 
Assessment and Intervention Pathway Protocol and Assessment of Need waiting times.
This review was compiled from publicly available website content and independently sourced, 
peer-reviewed and professional/regulatory literature. It is not medical, legal, or clinical advice, 
and is not a substitute for direct, independent verification by any family considering this or any 
similar service.
Additional Resource
Learn More: https://timetotalkslt.com